


memento

by Nielrian



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-17
Updated: 2019-03-17
Packaged: 2019-11-21 20:06:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18146837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nielrian/pseuds/Nielrian
Summary: He comes up short when he gets a good look at the envelope. Its flap has been tucked in and its contents are partially visible. It contains a single color photograph.





	memento

**Author's Note:**

  * For [notsodarling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/notsodarling/gifts).



> [prompt:](http://jumbled-nonsense.tumblr.com/post/183522124283) so, Michael has a picture of him and Alex with their guitars, looking happy, so I’m just gonna automatically assume that Alex has one too. But like, then I start wondering where Alex’s copy would be - does he still have it? Did he take it to the Middle East with him? Did he lose it? Does he still have it?

“Are you sure it’s in here? Could be in the kitchen drawer?”

Michael is wrist-deep in the bedside nightstand, searching through all of the accumulated miscellany, the odds and ends of occupying a space.

“Yes.” Alex barely has to raise his voice to be heard from the living room. “It’s there, I promise. The guy’s number is written on the outside of the invoice’s envelope.”

Michael abandons the top drawer and begins rummaging through the next drawer down. “If he’s local you should just be able to get him to send over a replacement tile. No need for him to come back out. I can’t believe he didn’t leave a few extra.”

He lifts a paper-clipped pile of receipts out of the way, shifts a black leather notebook and uncovers a bound stack of envelopes. He tugs impatiently at the string until it slides off - drops it to the nightstand.

As he begins to flip through them, one envelope, much smaller than the others, slides free and drops to the floor with a tiny ‘snick’.

“Shit”, he mutters, and stoops to gather it up again.

He comes up short when he gets a good look at the envelope. Its flap has been tucked in and its contents are partially visible.

It contains a single color photograph.

What’s more, it’s a photograph Michael has seen before - seen dozens of times. In it, Alex and Michael, ten years younger, stand in the desert, the shadowed hills rising behind them in the distance. It’s not visible, but Michael knows that just off-camera is his old beat-up Chevy. Seventeen-year-old Alex’s attention is focused on his fingers moving on the frets of the guitar he’s playing. Seventeen-year-old Michael’s attention is on Alex as he watches him play, another guitar propped on the ground at his feet, the neck clutched in Michael’s then-undamaged hand. He’s smiling in the photo, almost laughing.

Michael remembers the day. He doesn’t remember what song Alex had been playing. He doesn’t remember what he was laughing at. He feels, somehow, like he should - like the specifics of the moment should have been engraved into his mind along with the feeling it evoked.

Michael’s copy of the photo is in a box in the Airstream with what few other items he would call precious to him. He used to look at it sometimes - before. Before Alex left for the whatever-th time and before thinking of him left a feeling in Michael’s gut like he’d swallowed a rock. It’s still in pristine condition like Michael had been afraid to touch it.

Alex’s copy, on the other hand -

It’s been folded in half, and then in half again, into a neat little rectangle. The once high-gloss photo is lined with cracks. The edges are worn; so worn, in fact, that they’ve gone slightly soft where he thumbs it. The corners are softened, nearly rounded. One corner is missing entirely, almost like it’s been dog-earred away. The creases where the photo’s been folded and unfolded are nearly worn through, the color seeping away from the cracks over time. The center of the photograph has a tiny cross-shaped hole where the folds meet.

Michael knows, somehow, that this photograph has been places and seen entire continents he will never see.

He replaces the photo in its envelope, careful not to damage it further. With shaking hands and an absent mind he places the envelope back into the stack with the others and closes the drawer.

When he returns to the couch he takes Alex’s face in his unsteady hands and kisses him; once, twice, again and again until his lips feel bruised and his hands have mostly stopped trembling.

He pulls away, just barely, just enough to see Alex’s dark eyes come dazedly open.

“Did you find what you needed?” he asks, voice low and slow like he’s been drugged, his eyelashes fluttering like he can’t decide if they should be open or closed.

Michael butts his forehead into Alex’s, rubs his nose along his soft cheek, breathes him in.

“Yep.”

 


End file.
